


Her Own Narrative

by Windian



Category: Tales of Crestoria
Genre: Chapter 5 Spoilers, F/F, Implied/Referenced Child Abuse
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-09-05
Updated: 2020-09-05
Packaged: 2021-03-07 01:42:12
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,017
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/26288935
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Windian/pseuds/Windian
Summary: Yuna Azetta never lies. Not about the important things, at least.After the Condemnation at Centreport, Yuna visits Penelope at the hospital.
Relationships: Yuna Azetta/Penelope
Comments: 3
Kudos: 21
Collections: Ladies Bingo 2020





	Her Own Narrative

**Author's Note:**

> Written for @ladiesbingo challenge on Dreamwidth, for the card: Tragedy.

“Oh no, Yuna. No.”

Penelope sits up in the hospital bed, and maybe it’s just wishful thinking, but Yuna thinks there’s more colour in her face.

“You heard, then,” Yuna says breezily. It’s not a question. The hospital has given the star actress a large, private room that looks out over the Vision Central plaza.

 _At least sick people have some entertainment,_ she thinks, for the justice served by the Enforcers is little more than that: a diversion.

“I don’t have long, mademoiselle. I have to leave the city. I’m going to travel with Vicious and Kanata, to try to fix this whole awful system. The vision orbs, the Enforcers. Everything.” Yuna crosses the room in long strides, puts her hand to Penelope’s brow. “How are you feeling?”

Penelope pushes her hand away roughly. _Good_ , Yuna thinks. That’s the Penelope she knows.

“Let me _see_ ,” Penelope says.

Yuna pokes her tongue out at her.

“God, Yuna. You can’t even hide it.”

“Not unless I start keeping my trap shut. Which as we both know well, isn’t going to happen.”

“How can you joke!” Penelope says, aghast, eyes full of daggers. “Why would you do such a thing, Yuna? You know those people had it out for you. Why did you give them the perfect chance to condemn you? Why do such a thing for my sake?”

Yuna smiles. “For your sake? I was just giving my honest review. You really were dreadful, Penelope.”

“You certainly chose an interesting moment to be honest, didn’t you?” Penelope shoots at her.

Yuna lifts a fluttering hand to her heart in shock. “I? Mademoiselle, I never lie. Not about anything important, anyway.”

“I’ve said it before, but you ought to have been an actor,” Penelope says, shaking her head. She smiles, the barest dream of a smile. “Yuna, you’ve always been so good to me, ever since we were children.”

But the dream fades and the day breaks, overcast and choked with cloud.

“It wasn’t your fault, you know,” she says.

“Pardon?” she asks, although she knows. She knows because the woman looking at with a brittle gaze isn't Centreport's star actress, but 'Pen, her oldest friend. 'Pen, who hid her bruises with smiles and her mother's silk scarves. 'Pen, whose window she'd clamber through, late at night, to kiss, although one night, she'd discovered an awful secret--

“I know you’ve always carried that guilt around like a stone on your back," Penelope says. "You’ve always looked out for me, and I know you’ve been casting a net out to try to find my father.”

“How--” Yuna starts.

“Don’t ask me how I know.”

They’ve never spoken about that day. She can still see it now like an afterimage burned onto the back of her eyes. Penelope’s mother manhandled into the square, the cries for her condemnation… her own hot hatred, eliminating thought, eliminating reason…

As voices called for her own condemnation, a quiet voice had cut through the fear: “You deserve this. Eye for an eye.”

Yuna drops the act. “I’m sorry,” she says, and she bows her head deep, prostrating herself low. Penelope puts a hand on her head, and strokes her hair.

“I don’t want to die with you hating yourself, Yuna,” Penelope says. Yuna starts at that hard, blunt word, _die_ , but Penelope keeps stroking her hair.

“It took me a long time to come to terms with what my mother was. I loved my mother… but I hated her too. Most people don’t understand that those two things aren't mutually exclusive. And even though I was angry, I loved you Yuna. You were always there for me, in a way that even my own mother never was. I never blamed you, not even from the start. I blamed myself, for being too stupid, for not being quick enough, for not being talented enough...”

“Penelope...”

“Love is odd, isn’t it? I can’t help but love my mother, even now. Even knowing full well what she was.”

Penelope’s fingers move gently, tenderly, through her hair, teasing stardust tingles. To her embarrassment, Yuna cries in her friend’s lap.

“Shh,” says Penelope. “It’s OK.”

How long had she been waiting to hear those words? _“I don’t blame you.”_

Yuna wipes away the tears on her sleeves, sitting back up on the bed. “Thank you, Penelope.”

“I’ve wanted to talk to you about this for a long time. And I don’t know how much longer I’ll last, so...”

“Don’t speak that way,” Yuna says. She blows her nose on her sleeve. “You heard my review, _non_? Is that any way for an actress of your calibre to end her career?”

The tiny sparkle in Penelope’s eye says, _I know what you’re doing._

But her hair hangs limply and lifelessly, her skin pallid. She looks exhausted. “Be that as it may, I don’t know if I have it in me.”

 _I refuse to let her give up her dignity,_ Yuna thinks. _I won’t let her._

“So you mean to say you’re happy being a part of their little melodramatic narrative? The poor sick actress, how moved everyone was by her performance… how fortunate, you don’t even have to perform. No one’s really watching anyway; they only care about the story they’re spinning for you.”

Penelope grimaces.

“What bullshit. The Penelope I know wouldn’t let her own narrative be written for her. She’d carve out her own destiny, even if she had to use her own blood!”

Exhausted as she is, Penelope smirks.

“You truly think so much of me?”

“Always, my darling,” Yuna says.

“Well, then I’d better hurry up and get better, so I don’t let you down. And Yuna? Don’t get caught by the Enforcers, would you? I’ll be expecting you to do a write-up of my next performance.”

“You know me.”

“I certainly do,” Penelope chuckles. Completely exhausted now, she lets her eyes drift shut. Yuna’s breath catches-- but she only sleeps, chest rising and falling softly. There’s more colour in her, her jaw set stubbornly.

Yuna leans down to kiss Penelope on the brow, to seal the promise.


End file.
